Just good business
by Peladon
Summary: In the weeks after the battle Elizabeth learns the truth about Beckett


Just good business

The reign of Elizabeth Swann, King of the fourth Brethren Court, lasted seven days. Two days of plotting, a day of battle, a day of love and three days of celebration, then it was over. Even so it went down in the history books as one of the longest reigns of a Pirate King, but only because pirates like a drink, and several if they can get them, and where better to celebrate Beckett's demise than the well provisioned fortress of Shipwreck? Besides it gave time for the last of the Company's flotilla to disperse, to flee home to blameless existence lest the Flying Dutchman and her captain sited them.

On the eighth day the Pirate Lords and their crews took their hangovers and their squabbles and scattered to the four winds and the seven seas, and with their sailing the court was disbanded and life within the city of wrecks resumed the tenor of the decades past. A life she had no part in. For a hundred or more years there had been no king of this city and it's occupants would not accept one now, her or any other. Pirates needed no king and in Shipwreck Cove the keeper of the code was the only law required.

Sao Feng's men had left with the others, taking home the ship that he had willed to her. She could have gone with them, they had respect enough for her now to accept her as an equal to Mistress Chang, but as the blood roaring rage at her father's murder burnt out she found that her taste for the life of the canon and sword had died with it. Her only role in Shipwreck had been as a pirate captain, and, even as the dreams of battle faded, she knew that there was no other she could accept. That left her with the question of where she would go and who she would become.

Jack Sparrow had sailed on the fourth day of her reign, with the titles of kingmaker and deathmaker added to his legend and the gulf between him and his father a little narrowed. The chasm between she and Jack, however, had never seemed larger.

They had said their goodbyes at the rail of the Pearl and he had not waited for further conversation. She had not minded that, truth was they had said little to each other since that meeting on the shore of the Locker, and the magnitude of his generosity on the deck of the Dutchman meant that she felt more than a little shamed in his company. She knew only too well what he had given up for Will, and maybe for her, and their chance of some form of life together too; her thanks for that could never be enough, nor could her regret for her past actions. Given the nature of the man there was nothing more that she could say to him. She was a part of his past now just as he was of hers, she hoped that in time he would forget her cruelty, as well as forgive it, and recall her as a better part.

He had sailed out to his future with a smile on his lips and a steadiness in his eyes that told her that he had found himself again. Elizabeth had no idea where he would go or what he would do but she didn't think his story was ended yet.

Barbossa had sailed with him, still claiming the Pearl as his own but more uncertain of Jack than he had been, and with a strange look in his eyes and a wariness in his swagger that had not been there before. Elizabeth had seen the speculation in Jack's face as he looked at his old betrayer and adversary in those last days and she had known that their battles were not yet over. Who would win remained to be seen.

For Elizabeth it seemed that the future was a grey mist as strange and obscured as the horizon that had swallowed the Flying Dutchman in a green flash. With ten years to wait for Will's return to her it was tempting to sit back and do nothing but grieve for what she had forfeit, for her father, husband and home. To spend her hours wandering the shore that she and Will had shared for that one day, mourning a life lost to her and a future that seemed as beached as the wrecks that made up the city of pirates. So much had happened in so short a time that she felt as if all her years were spent and she now was in limbo waiting for her life to be declared over, just as Will's seemed to be over, Dutchman or no. Only when she knew what she was gaining was she jolted from meandering the past and into a serious consideration of her future, the knowledge of the coming child hanging heavy on her deliberations. Without a father and with a felon for a mother where would be safe?

It had been Teague who finally explained to her that which Jack had, apparently, understood almost from the beginning. That there was no warrant for her arrest, nor for Will, or for poor doomed James. There never had been. She could go where she pleased. It had never been about the law or the safety of the seas, only ever a little about personal revenge, it had always been about money and power and ambition; it had been just good business. Lord Beckett had been more pirate than Jack and it had always been a fraud.

'Go home.'

Teague had dropped a hand on her shoulder as he passed to take his favourite seat. The rasping voice was almost kind,

"England or Port Royale whichever seems best to you."

He took up his instrument and began to idly strum, his eyes drifting down to his wandering fingers,

"Your father loved you, so Jackie said, he'll not have left you un-provided for."

She had looked at him in amazement,

"I can't. They would hang me. For the child's sake at least I must find somewhere safe to wait for Will. What life would it be with a father gone and a mother hanged?"

Teague had raised his eyes towards her, hands falling still, and shot her a long, dark glance. For a moment he was silent as if considering something, then, looking down, he resumed his strumming,

"Kings don't hang the daughters of their friends on a common scaffold, girl. Haul them back to London to explain themselves, aye they'll do that. Even marry them off to other friends maybe," he said quietly, "but not lock them in a felon's prison and stretch their pretty necks."

His mouth curved in a death's head smile, cold and without humour,

"Might give the rabble ideas."

She stared at him in horror at the implication,

"But my father saw the warrant," her voice rose in protest.

Teague didn't seem to notice just went on strumming. As the chords spilt across the room between them he spoke softly,

"Yet your father wanted you to return to England. Do you think he meant to send you to your death lass?"

"No!" If she had still carried a sword she might have struck him, keeper or no.

"Then why did he find you passage to England?" he rumbled.

Uncertainty stirred,

"I don't know. He said he might still have some influence with the king."

The keeper nodded vaguely,

"Likely so," the dark eyes came up again to lock on hers, "but then would that king let Beckett hang you out of hand like a pirate?"

He watched the frown of confusion gather on her brow and gave a small, twisted smile,

"Kings need allies girl, and loyal subjects and agents to watch their backs as the empire expands. Hanging their daughters is unlikely to win or keep friends."

The pirate turned his attention back to his strumming, his face expressionless,

"No more is the hanging of a loyal navy man for a day's delay in giving chase."

He fell silent leaving her to think about that.

For a moment there was no sound but the sad and reflective tune springing from the strings he so casually plucked. The sound seemed to speak to her of all that she, and maybe he, had lost, and tears rose hot and bitter behind her eyes,

"But the warrants?" she said slowly, "my father saw them."

Eyes still on his fingers Teague nodded,

"But not for long I expect."

"No," she said slowly, remembering that terrible scene before the church, "Beckett took them back quickly enough."

She looked towards the man beside her, now seemingly lost in the music he conjured so effortlessly, yet she was sure he was as aware of her as if he were staring at her. Like his son he seemed to be layered, always hiding a part of himself and with one piece of his mind doing one thing while another watched the world around him.

"And the letters of marque?"

"Letter." Teague grunted, "just the one, for Jackie." He quirked an eyebrow, "How then did the king intend to pardon you and William Turner? Why not a warrant for your father's arrest also? No father would allow his only daughter to go to the gallows quietly."

She stood up and began to pace, feeling the child kick as her agitation grew,

"Beckett needed him."

Teague did not reply to that, instead he spoke at apparent random,

"Long way to England, long voyage, why bother about one pirate lost when there are so many closer to hand? Can always catch him again."

Understanding twisted her stomach and chilled her heart,

"The warrants, they weren't real were they? No king signed them. Becket needed my father because he couldn't sign the requisitions and death warrants himself, he hadn't been granted the authority. Though I and Will might not understand that others would." She wiped a hand across her eyes, "James would have done so."

She stared at Teague's hands as they moved across the strings in some complicated dance,

"Which is why James had to be disgraced and imprisoned too. Beckett didn't know that he wasn't in Port Royale"

She sighed,

"If the king had truly issued those warrants then he would have known that James had resigned and was no longer at the fort."

Elizabeth closed her eyes in sudden realisation,

"A day's delay could be explained in so many ways, and my father would not have betrayed James actions, or even allowed them, if he thought it carried any danger. It would have taken several hours to be ready to sail anyway, why should the King see it as assisting Jack? A miscalculation perhaps, but nothing more, and the admiralty would have stifled any suggestion of disloyalty, for their own sakes if not for James's."

Elizabeth sank into a chair as another thought came to her with horrifying clarity,

"If the King knew of Beckett's plan for Jones heart there would have been no need for my father to die. "

Teague nodded and shot her another dark look,

"Just good business luv, to Beckett. King's a long way away, be a while before he hears about it, and by then the thing is done and Beckett would have something worth being forgiven for, and plenty of profit. Paper and ink is cheap and it got him what he wanted and kept your father from interfering. Don't suppose you looked at the date on the that letter of marque?"

"No."

He smiled slightly and let his eyes drop back to his hands,

"Jackie did. Was signed more'en a year before." he growled. "Knew Beckett wouldn't harm you, not until he had the compass or the heart. You were in no real danger girl as long as he didn't have what he wanted, neither was young Mr Turner, no more your father. Beckett needed him doing as he was told, and he would only do that while you were alive."

The death's head grimace flashed again,

"Hanging a governor's daughter was likely to get back to people he wouldn't want to know of it, at least not until he had his leverage." He shrugged without interrupting his playing, "once he had that then you were dead. Jackie understood that."

The tune he played became sadder still,

"Just good business like I said. T'was the Commodore who sealed your fate luv, when he gave Beckett what he wanted. Once he controlled the seas the King could do nothing against him, even if he wished to. Had no real need of you or your father then."

For a moment she stared at Teague in horror then turned away, the tears running fast and hot down her face as she thought of that last conversation with James,

"Dear God, and he knew it. At the end he knew it. I showed him what he had done, though I didn't understand it myself. He thought that I knew. I told him my father was dead, that Beckett had killed him. I taunted him with choosing the other side. He spoke of his other sins, but I didn't take the time to understand what he meant. He knew what he had done then. That's why he wouldn't come with me. Poor James he must have felt so lost." She swallowed on a sob, "To feel so…. blamed, a fool, so adrift at the moment of your death…… nothing he could ever have done would deserve that."

Teague's hands fell still for a moment and his eyes came up to meet hers, black and deep,

"No man deserves to feel lost at the moment of his death girl."

His fingers resumed their wandering of the strings, but his eyes held hers for a moment longer and she felt the blood rise hot in her cheeks. She could not be sure that Jack had forgiven her for her cruelty in the manner of the death she had wished upon him, but in that moment she was sure that Jack's father never would. Another reason to go.

She looked away.

"And my actions? Raising the colours against navy ships? Will that be forgiven too?"

Teague grunted,

"Not navy ships lass, Company ships. Requisitioned. No navy ships or navy men there. Not with the piles of civilians rotting in unnamed graves without trial or conviction. Kings know that the navy protects the empire's citizens not slaughters them."

He shot another hard look through the fringes of his charm bedecked hair,

"Who's to know anyway? Who's to tell with Beckett dead? Those with him?" He shook his head setting the trinkets chiming, "they will still their tongues and keep their heads low, close ranks and pretend they knew nothing of Beckett's actions. A fleet of pirates was all they saw, a couple captained by women in outlandish garb perhaps they will admit that, but they will know no more. You might see the knowledge in their eyes if you ever meet them, but their lips will never speak of it, except perhaps to their final confessor."

Teague's black gaze dropped to hands again.

"It will be buried girl, if they can manage it. Wouldn't do for their enemies to have the facts to make hay with. Deny all knowledge, say you were marooned somewhere and William was taken away in irons by pirates, those who know the truth will stay silent and leave you be as long as you do not threaten them."

"And if I do threaten them? Beckett murdered my father!"

"Then they might not forget and you would die, though not on any scaffold." He sent her another humourless smile, "Just good business girl, for the Company, and the King would make sure that he never knew."

He saw the stormy look on her face and turned away,

"What vengeance your father needed he has. You are alive and Beckett is dead. He is at peace if Calypso is to be believed, and you are with child. William will return to you in time and you can start anew and have the life your father won for you. What good would demanding justice be? There has been little honour or justice in any of this, so why should you expect it now?"

"Just good business," she said bitterly,

"Aye," he nodded sadly his face less shuttered than she had ever seen it, "when the Code is forgotten that's all there ever is."

"And in the end?"

"All men become pirates, then worse than pirates, mutineers.

***

A week later she sailed for Port Royale.


End file.
